Month: April 2025

Remember Max? He joined us for work experience earlier this year, impressed everyone, and then left us wondering how we’d managed before he arrived. Well, we’ve got brilliant news. We couldn’t let all that talent slip away, so we’ve brought him back properly. Welcome back to the Eighty3 family, Max.

When Max first walked into The Warehouse as a Birmingham City University intern, we knew within about two days that he had something special. Fresh perspective, genuine enthusiasm, proper design chops, and that rare combination of creativity and willingness to learn that you can’t teach. He tackled live client briefs, absorbed feedback like a sponge, and brought ideas to the table that made us sit up and pay attention. By the time his work experience placement ended, we were already plotting how to get him back.

Here’s what made the difference. Max didn’t just turn up and tick boxes. He immersed himself in the work. He asked questions. He explored Brierley Hill and the wider Black Country, gathering textures and inspiration from graffiti walls and street posters. He talked about his passion for print, his love of music and film, his hobby time spent 3D printing and painting miniatures. All of that life, all of that curiosity, it fed directly into his design work. That’s the kind of energy we want in our studio. Creative people who actually live creatively, not just between nine and five.

We’ve always believed in investing in talent, especially young designers finding their feet in the industry. The Black Country creative scene needs more opportunities like this. When you find someone with potential, you don’t just wave them off with a reference and good luck wishes. You bring them into the fold, give them real work, let them grow, and watch what happens. Max has already proven he can handle live briefs and client expectations. Now we get to see what he does when he’s fully embedded in the team, working on bigger projects, developing his skills alongside designers who’ve been doing this for years.

Over the coming weeks we’ll share more about Max’s journey, his skills, and the fresh perspective he brings to our close knit team here at The Warehouse. For now, we just want to say: we’re absolutely thrilled to have you back, Max. You’ve earned this. Let’s make some brilliant work together.
If you’re reading this, drop a comment and make him feel at home. The Eighty3 family just got a bit bigger, and we couldn’t be happier about it.

Sometimes the best brief you’ll ever get comes from a room full of five-year-olds. Last week, Rebecca and Emily swapped The Warehouse for the classroom, heading over to Brierley Hill Primary School to talk to a group of brilliant Year One students about creative careers for kids and what life as a graphic designer actually looks like.

And the kids did not disappoint. They’d done their homework, come prepared with some genuinely cracking questions, and were absolutely full of enthusiasm. Special mention, though, has to go to Emily’s cat costume, which stole the show entirely and may have upstaged the entire presentation. No shame in that.

Emily put together a presentation that broke down what we do at Eighty3 into fun, simple ideas that even 5 and 6 year olds could get their heads around and get properly excited about. Watching their faces light up as they got to grips with the design process was one of those moments that reminds you exactly why you do what you do. Graphic design shapes everything around us, from the cereal box on the breakfast table to the logo on a school jumper, and getting kids to see that early feels important.

Visits like this are more than a nice day out. They’re a chance to show the next generation that creative industries are real, exciting, and very much on their doorstep. Brierley Hill has bags of talent, and if we can play even a small part in nurturing that, we’re absolutely here for it.

Who knows? We might have just met a few future Eighty3 team members. Watch this space.

When it matters, you show up. And last week, our director Rebecca did exactly that, sitting down with Richard Parker, West Midlands Mayor, to talk about something close to our hearts: the future of creative education in the Black Country.

The roundtable, hosted by the Black Country Chamber of Commerce at Beacon Vision, brought together voices from across the region to tackle some big questions. Nightlife economy, youth employment, skills gaps. Important stuff, all of it. But for us at Eighty3, one issue stood out above the rest.

Wolverhampton University’s School of Creative Industries is facing proposed cuts, and that concerns us deeply. The Black Country has always punched above its weight when it comes to creativity, craft, and making things that matter. That tradition doesn’t sustain itself. It needs investment, it needs institutions, and it needs people willing to back the next generation of designers, makers, and thinkers who are coming through. Without the right training on their doorstep, where do those young people go? And more to the point, where does that leave the region’s creative businesses in ten years’ time?

Eighty3 was built in the Black Country and we’re staying in the Black Country. Our home at The Warehouse in Brierley Hill has seen some brilliant minds come through the doors, and we want that to keep happening. We need local universities producing local talent. We need creative education to be treated as the serious economic and cultural asset it genuinely is, not a line item to be trimmed when budgets get tight.

Rebecca made sure that perspective was heard at the table. Not with grand speeches or polished talking points, just a straightforward, honest case for why creative sector training matters to businesses like ours and to the communities we’re all part of. That’s how we think change gets made. You turn up, you speak plainly, and you make the case.
We’re proud to have had our voice in that room. And we’ll keep making it, for as long as it needs to be made.